Rapid and sensitive high-performance liquid chromatographic method for simultaneous determination of retinol, alpha-tocopherol, 25-hydroxyvitamin D3 and 25-hydroxyvitamin D2 in human plasma with photodiode-array ultraviolet detection

A new rapid and sensitive high-performance liquid chromatographic method using 0.5 ml of plasma has been developed for the simultaneous determination of retinol (vitamin A), alpha-tocopherol (vitamin E), 25-hydroxyvitamin D2 and 25-hydroxyvitamin D3. The eluate was monitored with a photodiode-array detector with two fixed wavelengths (267 nm for vitamin D, 292 nm for alpha-tocopherol and retinol). For all compounds, including internal standards, the method provides extraction recoveries greater than 81%. Detection limits were equal to or lower than 1.5 microg/l for the 4 vitamins. Linearity of standards was excellent (r>0.999 in all cases). Intra-day and inter-day precision were generally acceptable; the intra-dayassay C.V. was 3/4 7.7 for all compounds and the inter-day-assay C.V. was <9.2% except for the lower concentrations of 25-hydroxyvitamin D3, 25-hydroxyvitamin D2 and alpha-tocopherol (10.8, 11.8 and 11.9, respectively). The important properties of the present method are its ease of use, its rapidity, since sample preparation was achieved in 15 min and all the compounds were eluted in less than 15 min, and its small sample volume required (=0.5 ml), which enables it to be used in pediatric practice.